By Jill Grinnell

The PA field hockey team had an emotional triple overtime victory over Ocean Lakes, as junior center mid Madi San Diego scored the game-winning shootout shot in the last second two weeks ago. 

“The competition throughout the whole game was pretty tight because we’re evenly matched with Ocean Lakes, and it was 0-0 the entire game,” said junior goalie Caroline Gilman. “We were playing defense almost the entire time, and we didn’t have many shots.” 

“I was nervous throughout the whole game because I know some of the girls on the team and how well they play,” said San Diego. “They were on our side for most of the game, so we really had to work our defense.”

Throughout the duration of the hour-long game, neither team scored, which resulted in overtime. “If it’s still tied 0-0, then the game goes into overtime, which is 15 minutes long,” said Gilman.

After the first overtime, neither team had scored, and the game went into a second overtime. In the second overtime, “shootouts happen, which are like soccer penalty kicks,” said San Diego.

During shootouts, each team picks about five players, and one at a time they go up and go against the goalkeeper for 10 seconds to try and score a goal.

“I was nervous because I’m so inexperienced with the whole game, and I had never gone into overtime before,” said Gilman, who has only been playing for one year. “I had also never done real shootouts before, so it was definitely a huge learning experience for me.”

 The intensity of the game grew when they went “into sudden death, which is where whoever scores will win the game,” said San Diego. 

“I saved the first shot, and then Madi came up to shoot her shot, and if she hadn’t made it, then we would’ve had to keep going until someone scored,” said Gilman.

San Diego “started crying because we didn’t know if the last shootout that ended up winning the game was going to be counted or not.” San Diego did not know if the shot counted because “she shot right as the clocked turned 0,” said Gilman. 

The team was ecstatic when the referee declared the shot, which won the team the game.

The team lost to Cox Thursday, running its record to 5-4. Senior night is this Thursday against Green Run.